Chapter Text
The sheet shrouding the display was a poor excuse for hiding all that was horrifically beautiful. Will was the exception to the rule of only clergy and investigators. None of them had made the slightest effort to remove her from the premises. She couldn’t blame them for being distracted by the gothic horror standing concealed from prying eyes. Though the painted and sculpted eyes of the holiest looked down upon the horrors of mortal sin.
She couldn’t find it within herself to entirely call it sinful. It felt too easy, too naive. All of it was simply too easy.
There was an old impulse to step forward, clear the scene, take it all in for herself. She wished nothing more than to fall back into an old dance. She’d been out of practice. Clearly Hannibal hadn’t.
“Signora.”
Her head turned as an office seemed to notice her presence, noting that she simply didn’t belong in this crowd of investigators and officers. Rushed Italian went in one ear and out the other.
“I don’t speak—“
“He says you don’t belong here. This is a crime scene, Signora.”
Not that it could be misconstrued as anything else. Certainly not a children’s fair. Will held her jacket closed and turned to walk, locking eyes with the priest, who was conversing with an officer. The man seemed to straighten and nod whilst saying something she could not hear to the officer. Her spine straightened as the officer who had spoken to her came by her side.
“LaManna,” said the other officer, “non lasciarlo uscire. Voglio parlare con lui.”
Will looked at the man she presumed was LaManna. “What did he say?”
“He said,” LaManna replied, “that he wants to talk to you.”
Will looked at the officer then at the concealed crime scene. “Alright.”
The chairs were not quite comfortable. Not that comfort had mattered until now, when her joints were aching and it felt as if her back had a constant weight against it. Deep, silent breaths seemed to soothe most of the swirling and movement, as well as the slight press of her own hand against her lower abdomen. She hadn’t been offered anything yet; not water nor anything to eat. She didn’t exactly think the Italian police were the type to butter up a witness.
Likely it would be questions as to what she had been doing there, why she was so impeding on an investigation, so on and so forth. Something Will could easily talk herself out of.
Her free arm crossed over the other, shielding her body as she watched the bodies move from one spot to another, like ants scurrying toward their tasks.
“Signora Graham,” came a voice beside her.
Will’s head turned to see a man perhaps Jack’s age sitting beside her. Short salt and pepper hair, a beard. He looked quite comfortable in the chair. He certainly wasn’t there to be questioned. It took barely a second for Will to recognize that he was a part of the force. It took barely another second for him to introduce himself.
“Chef Investigator Rinaldo Pazzi,” said the man, “Questura di Firenze.”
Her brows raised. “You’re quite the ways away from Florence, Inspector,” she replied coolly There was another shift inside of her. She didn’t respond to it.
The man inclined his head. “You’re quite a ways away from Baltimore, Signora.” His body shifted to shield them both from view. Will’s reaction as well as Pazzi’s own intent were in one viewing field. Their own.
Will breathed in once more and looked straight ahead at a unremarkable carved clock. The wood was quite fine, polished. Hannibal might have enjoyed it. She could see it in his home in Baltimore. A finger tapped, then another. Pazzi was taking the four to seven seconds of silence to see who would fill it. Will wouldn’t give him that satisfaction at all.
A breath. Ha. She won.
“I read your case file. Everything I could find about your time at the FBI. And your incarceration.”
A bitterly amused laugh barely left her lips. “I was acquitted. You’d know that if you really read it.”
“Quite clear,” said Pazzi. “I also read about what happened in Baltimore, when you and several others were injured. One killed.”
Her jaw was set quite tightly. She breathed through the tension and finally looked at him, though did not respond verbally. Pazzi resumed, “You come to Palermo. You are staying in a hostel, yes?”
“You read up on me, you know my movements. What else do you know?”
“I know that you arrive and a body is discovered in a fashion quite grotesque.” Pazzi watched her. “You have been spending much time in the Capella dei Normani. Father Franciello said you spend more time than most tourists.”
“I’ve been praying,” Will responded, “as most tourists, I’d assume.”
“What does Will Graham pray for?” Asked Pazzi.
Another bitterly amused sound. “What does anyone pray for?”
“Depends on what the desire is.”
Will’s eyes shifted slightly over Pazzi’s shoulder to the officers at the desk, looking over files and speaking. On a good day, Will barely understood English let alone Italian. She’d grown up with French Creole speakers and those with accents thick enough to make a Northerner’s head spin. Language barrier aside, she understood that police proceedings were broadly universal.
“I think God lost interest in any concept of prayers from me a long time ago,” she responded coldly.
“And yet you keep trying,” came Pazzi’s quick response. “Even for atheists, there is some comfort in the notion of prayer. It leaves you with the distinct feeling you’re not alone.”
Will’s eyes moved back to Pazzi’s and she held his gaze until one of the officers came over. “Signora,” he said, “vieni con me.”
Pulling her coat across herself, Will stood. Pazzi’s head leaned back and he nodded. “Ciao.”
The questioning was classic and predictable, almost boring. She’d heard tell of how the Italian police could be a bit less regulated than American police, especially in cases of American tourists and grisly homicides. Will answered their questions as blandly as she could, which was not that much of an effort. It was a detached, easy intention. Her arms loosely crossed in front of her and her crossed legs certainly gave off the impression that she was guarded. Then again, par for the course for Will Graham.
An hour of Italian to English and back to Italian translations led her to being released. Certainly they would be keeping an eye on her. It would be naive to think they would not. Many eyes were on her here and she knew it was not only the carved marble faces. There were not many places in this world she could disappear; not truly, not as one would wish to.
Her stomach churned, acid burning and hormones sending signals to find something to eat. A general tiredness was her baseline. Something more hearty than a few bites of a meal would have to be in order before she returned to the chapel.
Her feet made a soft sound as she descended the stairs and a figure briefly obscured her path. Inspector Pazzi held a manilla envelope under his arm, secured by a grip. Will stopped on the landing, adjusting her glasses. “Unsatisfied by our previous conversation, Inspector?”
“Our conversation requires more specifications,” responded Pazzi. “I find us kindred souls, Signora Graham. We share a gift of imagination.”
A bitter sound of amusement. “To say the least,” she said. “Though I think we differ on what else we share.”
“And what is that?”
“I have more scars than you,” replied Will. “Scars of a woman who grabbed her gift by the blade instead of the handle.”
Pazzi transitioned the envelope to his hands, almost presentationally. “You grabbed the wrong end.”
“Silly me,” Will said without an ounce of humor.
Pazzi’s fingers opened the envelope slowly. “You know who murdered the man in the Cappella Palatina.”
Her eyes narrowed. “And so do you.”
There was a nod of acknowledgement “Indeed. We met, two decades ago, under similar circumstances to this. His work has…improved since then. Il Mostro, we called him. The Monster of Florence.”
He paused, seeming to wait for a beat of recognition at the name. Only muted curiosity as the connections waited with baited breath to be made. Pazzi’s weathered fingers undid the small clasps sealing the envelope and began to pull out old photographs. “His work has stayed in my mind these twenty years. Tableaux’s which haunt my waking hours as well as my resting ones.”
Something inside Will prickled at attention. Her eyes moved down to the photographs; black and white images of crime scenes. Ghastly images, to the common eye. To others, more taboo, perhaps something of a different ilk rippling across the surface. The photograph which first captured her attention was placed in her hands. A man and a woman lying in the back of a pickup truck. The man’s body was blue, bloated. Perhaps his death had been earlier than the woman’s. A tree with what seemed to be oranges almost spooning him from behind. There were flowers in the woman’s mouth and a sheer cloth barely concealing her form. Her left breast revealed, though simultaneously concealed with flowers. A rather artistic, Renaissance touch. Utterly Italian. It smelled like Hannibal.
Pazzi’s attention was rapt on the photograph in Will’s hands. He seemed transfixed. “Do you recognize it?”
Memories of books in Hannibal’s library, sketches and marked pages. Fond recollections and references to art. Of all the artists, one stuck out most prominently.
“Botticelli,” Will replied. “Primavera.”
“Exactly Primavera.” Pazzi held another photograph. This time, it was of the actual painting with the label “Galleria degli Uffizi” under it. “Match. Match. Esattamente.”
Will handed the photograph back. “You went to the Uffizi Gallery to investigate him. Il Mostro.”
“Investigate,” confirmed Pazzi, “observe. I thought I would find a monster there, at the Uffizi. But I did not find a monster. I found a man.” He produced another, black-and-white photograph from the envelope. “The Monster of Florence.”
Will took the photograph. It was the photograph of a young man, perhaps in his mid-twenties. A smoother face but that same look in his eyes. A suit, not as fine or designed as the ones he would wear twenty years later. Hair a bit shorter than present-day but in that same, contained style. Those same cheekbones. That same look in his eyes. Young, still handsome.
Her lips parted in recognition. Pazzi leaned his head back as he saw its confirmation. “He is the young man I would see, day after day, sitting in front of the painting in the Uffizi as if he were in prayer. As transfixed as I imagined. Obsessed.”
“Seems a fitting word,” Will replied. She could see it vividly; a young Hannibal with his back turned. She imagined herself there, too. She would have been younger than him, at the time; much younger. As she stepped toward him, in her mind, she was as she was now in the present. His profile could be seen the closer she stepped; focus as he looked from painting to sketchbook. Graphite staining his fingers as he wiped away the rare imperfections. Practiced hands. Wonderful hands and fingers caressing the outlines and creating shading as he went about recreating the painting on his own canvas.
A practice canvas.
Her eyes tore herself from the image of the man to return to the present. She went to hand the photograph back but Pazzi shook his head, handing her the folder. Surprised, she tucked the photographs back inside and sealed it once more with the metal clasps. “Your investigation wasn’t successful.”
“I was certain of it. It was a moment of recognition. At last, we would capture him. A moment that should have been my triumph.” Pazzi seemed nearly haunted. “I could not let him get away too quickly. The Questura entered his home, nearly destroying it in order to find evidence.”
Will shook her head. “But Hannibal Lecter never leaves evidence. He eats it.”
If that statement made the FBI tremble, it did not seem to entirely shake Pazzi off his stance. Admirable. Maybe foolishly so. Will saw the weathered look of a man who had been haunted for two decades. Will, herself, could only think to relate. Twenty- years of Hannibal Lecter haunting one’s dreams seemed a fitting torture for the ninth circle of Hell. Dante Alighieri could only dream of such torment.
“Another man innocent of those crimes was convicted.” Pazzi looked rather disgusted. “Not innocent of others, but a fitting way for the Questura to close the case.”
“Except it has never been closed,” Will responded, “because Hannibal Lecter always escapes trial and punishment. It has a habit of slipping off him.”
“And sticking to others. Namely you.” Pazzi straightened. “You came to Italy to find him.”
Will nodded. “Amongst other things.” She felt something twisting unnaturally and uncomfortably within her. Reflexively, her hands crossed over her front. The envelope felt like a poor attempt at a shield for her body. She held it firmly. “I have a request, Inspector.”
Pazzi gave a cautious nod. “Name it.”
“Access to the crime scene in the chapel,” she negotiated. “I know it’s Hannibal Lecter. I need to see it clearly.”
“Your clarity,” confirmed Pazzi. “It is your gift.”
“Some might call it a curse.” The notion of it as a gift was disconcerting. It reminded her too much of Hannibal’s words; words which swirled around and wrapped her in embraces which had felt easier to live with in the past. Now it felt hollow, aching. “Regardless, I need some time with the scene. And I know they won’t necessarily be pleased to see a tourist there.”
“A tourist with quite the tie to the FBI.” Pazzi nodded. “This evening. I can convince them to give access. Meet me there. We will see Il Mostro’s return display in the light of the moon.”
Will’s shoulders eased and she nodded. She made to hand back the envelope, earning a shake of the head from Pazzi. “Please. Acquaint yourself with this version of Hannibal Lecter.”
She held the folder to herself again, nodded, and made an informal exit from the police building. The air was warm, certainly warming up, but she kept her coat loosely buttoned around her. Her feet carried her through the streets, away from the police department, toward a small shop where the smell of food lifted her tired, aching spirit. All of the hunger she had repressed for months was returning to her, bidding her to regain an essence of strength.
Sitting in her room, takeaway container on the bed, Will looked over the photographs of the crime. Bodies cast in tableaus so similar to works of Botticelli. Most in the style of Primavera. Some with inspiration from The Birth of Venus or other paintings attributed to the great master’s work. All grotesquely artistic, belonging in a gallery somewhere. All Hannibal’s handiwork.
Even for something so primitive in his years, it had notes of promise; the way the bodies were posed, the attention to each cut. Will’s eyes poured through autopsy notes, though she admittedly had to translate more than a few lines to string together a complete picture of what was being said. Even without common language, visuals shared all that was important. It was a window into Hannibal’s youth. Into his beginning.
Will closed her eyes, palm down on the photograph. Those eyes peered out between the slits of her fingers, painting themselves onto her eyelids. The years, decades, those eyes held; the lights they’d seen leave this plane of existence and the cuts those hands had made. Thousands, perhaps millions, of repetitive lacerations, breaking of bones and sinews, catching how many buckets of blood and viscera?
But, also, how much beauty had those eyes and hands found in it all? How had he treated those whose flesh he manipulated, contorted, created into something of use? Where others saw horror, those hands had crafted something in honor of the artists who had walked these streets, breathed this recycled air. She thought of how artists and doctors—cut from the same cloth as Hannibal himself—had created everlasting art by looking at the soulless eyes of the dead and seeing such beauty in them. They had purpose despite their rot, and not to be used as food for the worms.
She walked to the truck bed, seeing the still corpses. Flowers scattered, highlighting the colored changes in the skin that death so often brought with it. Even rigor mortis had done its part in cultivating this living dead love letter to Botticelli and to the city that had cultivated his works. Will almost wanted to brush strands of hair away but dared not mar this beauty. The outlines, the margins, the space all were used so effectively and wonderfully. Will was no great connoisseur of art, but even she felt touched by the effort and obsession. An artist’s obsession, after all, resulted in some of the greatest masterpieces.
Turning, she heard the scratching of a pencil. Or, perhaps a sketching tool of another sort gliding across a pad. Almost in a spotlight was a figure with his back turned. A bit leaner of a figure but she still recognized that outline from sight alone. She didn’t need to see his face. The face from the photograph etched into her memory as she walked closer. It barely turned toward her. Only slightly so she could see how the shadow of the light clouded his eyes, his expression. Primavera was exalted before them, bathed and basked in spotlight.
That profile; the way the eyes caught the light. Those eyes never aged, never changed.
The image shifted, dissolving as if
paint were melting down the canvas. Will felt it on her skin, pulling her down, melting her down. Her eyes opened to see those sharp, ageless ones before her. Except they were glistening. Glistening, terribly sad. Filled with hurt, pain, betrayal. Something so deep that neither could dare speak its name.
White, hot lightning shot across her stomach.The paint dribbled and pooled together, swirling and cramping terribly as the lightning shot deeper and sharper into her core. Her hands came up, bracing against those shoulders connected to that neck, that head, those eyes. Those eyes which were wet, glistening with a convoluted mixture of pain, sadness, hurt, betrayal. Over and over and over. She’d seen those eyes, that hurt, too much.
Her bones ached as she clutched his shoulder. His hand came to the back of her head to force her into that embrace. Their bodies flat against one another; nothing between them. No life, no potential. There was no space, after all.There never had been and there never would be.
With a sharp gasp, Will pulled herself out of that image and grasped her chest. She felt her collarbone sharp beneath as her fingers pressed against the space so hard it might have hurt. Her heart was thudding as wildly as the shifting within her womb. Her hand moved there as some unconscious instinct instructed her to ensure it was alright. It was similar to how a rabbit sprinted after narrowly missing a bullet to the brain. Will’s eyes closed and she felt her lungs fill with air then gently relax as air was expelled out. She couldn’t gasp and gulp as she normally could; there seemed to be less and less space in her body nowadays.
Sitting back against the headboard, Will allowed herself to slump and collect herself. Eyes stared unfocused at the wall as she willed the silhouette of Primavera from her mind’s eye. Eventually she looked at the window, barely concealed with old curtains. The day would be long before she met Pazzi again. She could be content to sit for hours, to lose herself to her thoughts or to the stream.
A swift kick against her bladder, an uncomfortable twinge. No, time to get up.
The food she’d taken away was in the trash and Will walked the streets, watching the life continue around her. Holy persons, tourists, normal people, children, vendors; all bustling with joy, fears, dreams as she walked amongst them feeling as foreign as another species. She wondered how many of them knew of the horrors int he Cappella Palatina. Who amongst them knew that Il Mostro walked amongst them?
Will stopped before a store and looked inside, seeing fine silk. Certainly a place Hannibal might enjoy. How ironic if she stepped inside and saw him there, checking out a silk scarf. Even in the summer warmth, she was certain he would find a reason for it. His taste was fine. She’d balked when he’d made mention of fabrics she would look “quite elegant” in. Will had laughed at him:
“Elegance and me are like oil and water.”
“And what of us?”
“Depends on who is doing the comparing and contrasting.”
Hannibal had smiled, setting down the cup of coffee and placing the bottle of whiskey in a cabinet, away from Will’s reach. She’d eyed him through a squint as she had taken up her non-alcoholic cup of coffee between cold hands. Hannibal’s fine sleep shirt was not too big on her, but the way she had raised her shoulders against the silk had drawn out the topic of clothing fabric. Hannibal had questioned if she was uncomfortable.
There’d been irony in that.
Will had leaned against the refrigerator, head against the cool metal, and watched Hannibal as he continued slow cooking the eggs. Hannibal, who was shirtless underneath his robe due to Will wearing said shirt. Truly an honorable sacrifice.
“True, oil and water do not mix. Yet they are so closely entwined in phrase and element that one is hardly without the other.”
Will’s eyes rolled with muted fondness and faux-annoyance. “You’re working harder than necessary to be right. It’s okay to be wrong.”
There’s been a twitch of a smile that widened when Hannibal had looked at her. Will had smiled behind her cup, raising her brows. “I call victory this time.”
“This time,” Hannibal had acquiesced.
Her lashes fluttered at the memory as she returned to the present, eyes making momentary contact with the store clerk. Will averted and continued a few more paces, seeing clothing shops, toys, and quite a few other places. The warmth caused her to seek refuge in one such shop. A mixture of Italian and some choppy English greeted her. A few stammered “No thank you” and “Not right now” was enough for Will to live up to an American stereotype or two as she stepped deeper into the store, trying to lose herself in the facade of browsing so she could kill a few minutes. Sometimes, she really did long for a men’s section. Maybe she’d go there, find a few looser items of clothing. Her trousers were feeling quite uncomfortable and the width of a men’s shoe would relieve the swelling.
The looks she received were not altogether annoying. Will’s brain made the comparison between the men’s size and her own size—at least, pre-pregnancy—and purchased what would be most comfortable. Two pairs, just to be sure. Shoes, as well, which were immediately swapped out on the street and brought at least some relief to her swollen feet and ankles.
The solitude of her room was treasured until the sun started to go down. Photographs stored in the envelope, Will made her way back to the Cappella, meeting Inspector Pazzi at the steps. In professional Italian, he talked his way in, affording not even a bat of the eye Will’s way. She’d tried to make sense of his words in relation to her. Perhaps some half-assed explanation of her work with the FBI and how it could be relevant. It didn’t matter. As they entered, Inspector Pazzi handed her the photograph of the crime scene. Of course, the police had removed the large grotesque display. There was no sign the church had been soiled with such barbarity. Standing, now, in the quiet chapel without shrouds or curtains, Pazzi faltered in step, allowing Will to walk ahead until she stopped some feet away.
“Quite the sight, no?” Asked the inspector, watching as Will looked at the photograph.
Will couldn’t hide behind her glasses nor any veneer of indifference.“You see one, you see them all,” she attempted.
“Not entirely true,” said Pazzi. “There is always something different in what he leaves. Each time, something more.”
Red, contorted flesh stood stark against the marvel and aged murals and mosaics. Something modern yet not at the same time. Perhaps something the great artists would have studied. They did, after all, learn anatomy from corpses. Illegal autopsies, going against church doctrine and morals of the time. Morals never seemed to stay consistent. Taboos shifted and evolved to survive or die with the times. Will’s eyes lingered as there was a knocking at the door. She didn’t turn her head as Pazzi did.
She didn’t hear him leave. Her attention was fixated on the photograph, taking in the shape, its creation. Lashes fluttering, Will felt a wave of something akin to calm come over her. There was a cool, familiar settling in his chest opening up the vast space within. Her eyes closed. The pendulum of light swung.
Forward. Back. Forward. Back.
Forward.
Back.
Her eyes opened. No longer was the display a photograph but it was stark and real before her, staked into the ground. Like an artist leaving their masterpiece on a canvas. Quite the museum display it was.
Stepping toward it, there was a dull thumping in her ears. It didn’t just remain there; it seemed to echo through the chapel, bouncing off the high ceilings and corners. Even the candlelights flickered in time with the thumping, moving the shadows against the faces of carved saints, virgins, and cherubs.
Her lips parted as she studied the sculpture from each angle, taking in the formations.
“I splintered every bone, fracture them dynamically.”
Those hands, working with expertise and knowledge gained over years of both fulfilling a Hippocratic oath and mocking it. She saw them, bending, breaking, twisting.
“Made you…malleable.” Will’s eyes traced the contortions, feeling them mirrored on her own body. Invisible hands moving across her skin, twisting her bones but not breaking them. They would break others; not hers. There was a limit, it seemed, to the cruelty they would inflict on her themselves.
“I skinned you,” she continued, feeling the presence move into her own hands. Her fingers felt the aftershocks of the work. “Bent you, twisted you…trimmed you.”
It wasn’t foreign; it was personal to the nth degree. As if Will, herself, had done the work. Her own knives, her own knowledge. She was probably capable of all of it, in truth. She was capable of many things she hadn’t entirely been conscious of, it seemed.
She walked to the front of the sculpture, taking in the anatomy. “A valentine. Written on a broken heart.”
Thump. Thump. Thump.
Her lashes fluttered again. A soft intake of breath. “This is my design.”
The sculpture throbbed. Will felt the life within her quicken, pulling her into a new, shocking sense of reality as the sculpture shuddered and began to crack. Cords which kept sections in place began to twist and crack free, moving at painful and awkward angles as it unraveled from its shape.
Will stepped back, watching as the unraveled figure crumpled to the ground and twitched. Where its head had been separated from its neck, something black sprouted and bloomed, extending like branches out and curved up. Four long, bone thin legs emerged and hooves planted themselves on the mosaic until the body was supported. No eyes nor head were born but it didn’t seem to need it as it moved toward her, almost stalking. Deer stalking was something she’d seen a couple of times; it hardly ended well to those unprepared.
Stepping back, Will felt her back hit the altar and herself find the floor, hands bracing to prevent any injuries from the fall. The scent of viscera, meat, and something much worse overtook her senses as it loomed over.
Another quickening inside of her before there was a sharp, fluid kick.
Gasping, Will tore herself from the sight and grasped at her head. Her face was flush, hair and head wet with sweat. The front of her chest was damp and her back was wet with sweat as well. The figure was gone, of course. The crime scene photograph was somewhere not within her hand. Will’s eyes found the flickering lights of candles and the doors at the end of the aisle. Luckily for her, Pazzi was not present.
Somehow, she found the instinct to laugh. Her hand pressed against her chest, feeling it heave as her lungs struggled to get enough air inside. It was harder and harder to do now, vision aside.
Will brought her legs up, leaning her back against the altar. The shielding of her legs created a barrier between any omniscient observer and her body, allowing her free hand to press against her abdomen. “Look at that,” she remarked aloud, “see what he left us. His broken heart.”
There was a fluttering in response. Will closed her eyes, focusing on her breathing and rather erratic heartbeat. The air felt almost as good as water; something fresh, revitalizing. Her thumb moved in a near comforting motion over the path where the fluttering had been. “He knew I’d come,” she said, finding the desire to voice her thoughts rather than keep them bottled inside. “He knew I’d find him here. That we would find him.”
No, only her. Hannibal wouldn’t know of anyone else. Save Jack, perhaps. But certainly Will first.
Her tongue wet her dried lips as she stared where she’d seen the broken heart in her vision. Something within her ached at seeing it. A residual pain, much as her hands and fingers had felt as if they, themselves, had done the sculpting. She looked down, giving herself a brief reprieve. “How strange,” she murmured, “that I feel closer to him here.”
As if in response, another movement. This time, she felt it firmly under her hand. Will lifted her head, closing her eyes as she felt something strange burn behind them. A tight ball in her throat, a wave of something so remarkably like mourning. Taking in a slow, shuddering breath, Will wrapped both of her arms around herself and leaned her head against the tops of her knees. It was like her own heart was breaking. She felt bereaved, bereft. Tears wouldn’t fall; her tear ducts felt dry even though she willed them to work those tears so something, anything, would come of this built up pain in her chest.
"God only knows where we would be without him," she whispered.